Varied interpretations of death by Muslims
throughout the centuries have produced a com-
plex eschatology that can be divided into the
majority Muslim and the gnostic mystical views.
The majority perspective adheres to the teach-
ings of the Quran as they were transmitted
through mUhammad. These teachings warn and
guide believers away from sin and remind them
of the rewards and punishments of the afterlife.
The gnostic mystical view upholds an esoteric
understanding of death that is direct, personal,
and unmediated. This kind of understanding
is attained by means of mystical practices and
through visionary discoveries. The mystics, who
claim they have experienced death while alive,
describe how their souls departed from their bod-
ies and the world of matter and journeyed into the
realm of death. There they have seen the myster-
ies of Judgment Day and have experienced God’s
attributes of might and majesty. Thus, their belief
in the Quran and the teachings of the Prophet is
based on the personal insights they have gained
through the death journey. Some Muslims inter-
pret death as self-sacrifice and as an expression of
Faith. They refer to the Quran, which considers
those who die on the path of Islam and for the sake
of other Muslims to still be alive. Such a person
(martyr, or shahid), similar to innocent children,
escapes the intermediary stage between death and
resurrection (barzakh) and goes to paradise. The
culture of valorizing martyrs—those who die on
the path of Islam—has been enforced among the
Shii Muslims for centuries. Their paradigm martyr
is the grandson of Muhammad, Imam hUsayn ibn
ali, who died in battle at karbala at the hands
of his political rivals in 680. Imam Husayn is
the central figure in the mourning plays that are
annually held in commemorating his death and
in celebrating the fate and faith of the Muslim
martyrs. In the final analysis, for Muslims, life
and death are interconnected through one’s sus-
ceptibility to the realities of the unseen that are
transmitted by the Prophet or experienced by the
individual mystic.
See also baqa and fana; cemetery; FUnerary
ritUals; martyrdom; shiism; sUicide.Firoozeh Papan-MatinFurther reading: Muhammad Abu Hamid al-Ghazali,
The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, Kitab dhikr
al-mawt wa-ma badahu, Book XL of The Revival of the
Religious Sciences, Ihya ulum al-Din. Translated by T. J.
Winter (Cambridge: The Islamic Texts Society, 1995);
Jane Idleman Smith and Yvonne Yazbeck Haddad,
The Islamic Understanding of Death and Resurrection
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).Delhi
The capital of modern india, greater Delhi is situ-
ated on the west bank of the Yamuna River in the
northern part of the country. It encompasses an
area of about 572 square miles, which includes the
modern city of New Delhi, and is home to nearly
14 million people. Today, the majority of the city’s
inhabitants are Hindus from northern India, and
Muslims constitute its largest minority. There are
also a large number of Sikhs, many of whom fled
to the city from the Punjab at the time of the vio-
lent 1947 partition, when India became an inde-
pendent country. Delhi is also home to Buddhists,
Jains, Christians, and an international diplomatic
corps that serves at embassies in New Delhi, the
southern part of the city.
The history of Delhi is actually one of at
least eight different fortress cities built in close
proximity to each other over many centuries,
each designed to satisfy the needs and tastes of a
different group of rulers. The earliest is thought
to have been Indraprastha, a Hindu city that
existed 3000 years ago. Muslims from aFghani-
stan invaded at the end of the 12th century and
located the capital of the delhi sUltanate there
in 1193. The dynasties of the sultanate situated
their fortress cities on lands on the south side
of modern Delhi. Later rulers transferred the
capital to Agra or Lahore, but eventually they
returned to Delhi. The Mughal ruler Shah JahanK 186 Delhi